by Birch, Tony;
Odette walked slowly towards the coach, conjuring a distant memory with each step. ‘I remember this. I’m sure I do.’
‘That one used to go right by here, along Deane’s Line,’ Henry confirmed. ‘I would hear it coming by and run out there on the road to wave at the men inside.’
Yes. Odette remembered it too. The coach brought the managers and a foreman from the mine to the mission each Saturday. They would lunch with the priests, and afterwards stroll through the grounds slapping hard-working backs and handing out boiled sweets for the children and presents wrapped in decorated paper at Christmas. Odette, like the other kids, took the sweets although she felt they tasted a little sour.
She was about to touch one of the large wooden wheels of the coach when a more sinister image flashed before her – a coach full of children being driven away from the mission, crying for their mothers. Odette turned her back on the carriage.
‘I don’t reckon any person on the planet has gathered so much stuff in one place as you have here, Henry. You’ve got some collection.’
‘I have,’ Henry smiled, his chest lifting with pride.
Sissy rummaged through one of the tea chests and picked out a small plate, decorated with hand-painted red roses. The plate was covered in dust. She blew the dust away. ‘Is this for sale, Henry?’ she asked. ‘How much money do you want for it?’
‘If I was selling that plate it would be sixpence and not a penny less,’ he answered. ‘But you can have it for free. There’s more of them in the box. You can have a look and take any you want. You could make a set for yourself as good as the Queen of England has.’
Odette was hoping she might spot the bicycle, but all she saw were a couple of rusting frames and a collection of wheels with broken spokes.
Henry shifted excitedly from side to side. ‘You can have something more than them cups and saucers,’ he said.
Sissy was busy cleaning the dusty plate with the sleeve of her jumper and paid him no attention.
Henry raised an open hand, looking like a dishevelled preacher about to commence a sermon. ‘Wait right here, both of you. I will be back with something very special.’ He skipped across the yard and disappeared behind a dented old Dodge truck with flattened tyres. He made a terrible racket, the sound of somebody beating a petrol drum with a hammer.
Sissy looked across at Odette, who smiled and lifted her shoulders as if she had no idea what was going on.
‘I’m coming,’ Henry called. He soon appeared from behind the Dodge, walking a bicycle. The frame was painted red and the wheels, which didn’t quite match in size, had been scrubbed and oiled. The handlebar grips, made out of strips of leather from an old car seat, had been crafted by Henry himself. The basket on the handlebars barely resembled the wicker cray pot it had originally been; an item that had somehow travelled far from the sea to the junkyard. Henry brought the bicycle to a halt in front of Sissy.
‘Is that your bike?’ Sissy asked him.
‘No. It’s not mine. I don’t need a bicycle. I have a motor car that I’m repairing.’ He blinked nervously. ‘You can tell her, Odette.’
‘This is your bike,’ Odette said. ‘It’s a gift for your birthday, Sissy. Henry made it for you.’
Sissy threw her arms around her grandmother and kissed her. ‘I love you, Nan,’ she said, hugging Odette tightly. ‘Thank you, Henry. It’s so wonderful of you to make a bike for me.’
‘You need to jump on and take a test ride,’ Henry said. ‘The seat goes up. And it can go down too. The handlebars, they do the same. If it doesn’t feel right, I can fix them for you.’ Henry held the bicycle and Sissy hopped on the seat. Her foot touched the pedal with just enough bend at the knee.
‘I reckon it’s a good fit,’ Henry said, feeling pleased with himself. He gently pushed Sissy in the centre of her back and the bicycle eased forward, wobbling from side to side. As Sissy slowly found her balance and started to pedal, the bicycle picked up speed.
‘You have to steer it,’ Henry screamed, running after her. ‘Come on. Steer it.’
Odette and Henry watched Sissy circle the yard, a little unsteadily at first. Rowdy, who’d been laying on a bug-infested mattress beneath the wreck of a tractor, bolted out and trotted along behind, barking with excitement.
‘I really have to thank you, Henry,’ Odette said. She took a ten-shilling note from her pocket. ‘And you will be taking some money for your work.’
Henry vigorously shook his head from side to side. ‘I cannot do that, Odette. I made you a promise. I don’t need to take your money.’
She looked at the volume of unwanted goods in the yard. ‘You must need the money, Henry. None of this rubbish looks like it will be moving in a hurry.’
‘It’s not rubbish,’ he corrected her. ‘A dealer from Gatlin comes by here every once in a while. What he pays me is enough to get by on. I put some money towards my projects, and I still have plenty left over.’
‘Projects? Like building another bike?’
‘No. I’m thinking of one of them space rockets, like the Russian people made.’
‘Just because you made a bicycle, Henry, it doesn’t mean that you could build a rocket,’ Odette said, laughing.
‘Doesn’t mean that I couldn’t,’ Henry replied, with little doubt that he could.
Sissy quickly mastered the art of bicycle riding. She was soon steering the bike with confidence. Rowdy continued to trot alongside her like a royal escort. ‘Has that Kane boy been back here making trouble for you?’ Odette asked.
‘Maybe,’ he said.
Odette was worried for Henry. ‘What will you do if he does give you more bother?’
‘Rowdy will eat him. He’s a brave one. Anyway, like you told me yourself, Odette, I could shoot that boy.’
‘I was only joking when I said that, Henry. Shooting him would get you into all sorts of trouble.’
‘Don’t mean it’s not a good idea.’
‘Like your rocket’s a good idea?’
‘Yep. Like my rocket. I’ve got some gunpowder here to power it up and send it into space.’
‘Where’d you get gunpowder?’ Odette asked. ‘You shouldn’t be keeping it here. It’s dangerous. You’re supposed to have a licence to handle gunpowder.’
‘Are you sure?’ Henry asked.
‘I know because my father had an explosives licence. I still have the piece of paper in a drawer at home. Where’d you get hold of gunpowder?’
‘I found it up at the old quarry. I come into the ownership of all sorts of things. Found some detonators too.’
Sissy skidded to a halt in front of Henry. ‘I love the bike. Thank you.’
Odette remembered something that had been on her mind since the Sunday morning Henry had first been troubled by Aaron Kane. ‘You know, if you ever wanted to give the junkyard business away, Henry, you could sell the lot off. Maybe to that second-hand dealer from Gatlin that you spoke of. There’s a couple of decent huts up at Quarrytown that are empty. You could take over one of them. You wouldn’t have to be on your own anymore.’
Henry didn’t give Odette’s idea a second thought. ‘I wouldn’t be able to do that, Odette,’ he explained. ‘This is my place. Right here. This is where I was born. I’ve always lived here. I don’t want to be in any other place, Odette. You understand?’
Odette did understand. ‘Fair enough. We all have our own place. Or should do. But if you ever change your mind, you let me know.’ She nodded to Sissy. ‘We’ll be having cake and candles tomorrow if you’d like to come over, Henry? You’d be welcome.’
‘Thank you, Odette, but I couldn’t leave the yard alone. Like I said, I’m busy with my projects.’
‘Okay. Well, maybe I’ll see you next Sunday.’
Sissy rode ahead and Odette followed behind her across the rough ground, relieved that Sissy didn’t notice he
r clutching at her side.
Chapter Five
Odette had a canvas bag slung over one shoulder, weighed down with two bundles of greeting cards. ‘I’m off to the post office,’ she called out to Sissy, who was making the bed in the next room.
‘Wait for me, Nan.’ Sissy ran into the kitchen. ‘I’ll bring my bike and you can put that heavy bag in the basket.’
‘If you like, Sis. But I don’t reckon you’ll want to get stuck in town with me. If I run into one of the old girls we could be yarning until the sun goes down.’
‘I don’t mind. I like listening to your stories. I’m coming with you.’
As they walked over the footbridge Sissy stopped to look down at the riverbed. ‘I wish there was water in this river, Nanna,’ she said. ‘When the weather is warm I could swim the same as you used to do in the old days.’
‘Oh, I wish you could too. That water here was once the clearest you would ever see,’ Odette lamented. ‘The fish and eels would be swimming with us. The old people, they knew the river and its stories from the time it had run free. All along this way the water overflowed into the old billabongs. Now all we have is the muddy bottom and the frogs,’ Odette said. ‘There’s hardly a drop of water left for them.’
‘What happened to all the water?’ Sissy asked. ‘Tell me that story.’
‘There’s not much to tell. White people got even greedier than we thought possible. That’s what happened.’ Over the years Odette had witnessed local government officials seizing more and more land and then filling in old billabongs and covering the muddy ground with screening from the mine before selling off the land.
‘Between the farmers and the politicians we were left with nothing. Our people have been hurting since,’ she said.
‘Why’s that?’ Sissy asked.
‘Because the river, all the rivers, we need them. And they need us. This river underneath us, she’s not quite dead but if she gets any more sickness she will be gone soon.’
Odette spotted her old friend Millie Khan walking up ahead on the river track, heading towards town. Odette called out and Millie waved back. She’d known Millie all her life and was used to seeing her friend dressed in stockmen’s gear, with her hair cut short like a man’s. It was a look Millie had perfected as a teenager, disguising herself as a boy so when she worked the stock route with her father she avoided any unwanted attention from the men. Millie also liked to smoke cigars, an expensive habit she supported by braiding the best quality leather bridles, which stock riders and show jumpers travelled hundreds of miles to purchase. She’d been taught the skill from a young age by her late father, Morgan Carter, the best horseman, black or white, in the west of the state.
Morgan had earned his reputation working with the wild brumbies in the mountains. The horses would be driven back to Deane, broken in and sold as valued stock horses. Morgan Carter had a gift. He could command the most stubborn-minded brumby just by looking at it. A local politician and businessman, John Quinn, seconded Morgan from the mission to work in his stockyards. Quinn built his saddlery over the top of a reclaimed billabong and invited Morgan to run the business for him, raising his family in two rooms behind the stables, free from interference. Whenever a Welfare Board official made enquiries about one or more of the Carter children, Morgan directed them to the influential Mr Quinn, who vouched for the character of his most valued worker.
Morgan also worked closely with the Afghan cameleers, who operated between Deane and the stock routes across the desert. The Afghans would herd the brumbies for hundreds of miles and sell them to Morgan. It was how young Millie met her future husband, Yusuf Khan. Morgan Carter had no idea how a romance could have blossomed between Millie and Yusuf, but was pleased enough that the young man wanted to marry his daughter. Yusuf was a hard worker who was prepared to live at the saddlery, which pleased Morgan, as he didn’t want to lose his only daughter to the desert. After Morgan’s death Millie and Yusuf took over running the operation.
Although the horse trading business was finished, Millie and Yusuf remained in the house she’d been born and raised in. The building had become something of a local curiosity. Over the years the loose ground beneath the saddlery subsided and the old billabong was slowly devouring the house. One corner of the building had sunk completely, while the foundations of the second room had vanished into a cavity below the floor. Millie could rightly claim that she lived in the only house in the district where a person had to struggle uphill to get out of the front door.
‘That’s some bicycle you have there, Blondie,’ Millie commented to Sissy when the pair finally caught up with her. Odette didn’t appreciate the nickname and rolled her eyes in protest.
‘Sorry,’ Millie mouthed.
‘It’s her birthday gift,’ Odette explained. ‘Sissy’s just turned thirteen.’
‘Congratulations, big girl. I wish I was thirteen again,’ Millie said.
‘What would you do if you were, Auntie Millie?’ Sissy asked.
Millie took a long draw on her cigar and thought about the question. ‘Well, back then I’d have got hold of the best young colt I could find and headed north. And I wouldn’t have stopped riding until I was out of the state.’
‘You’d have been in some trouble,’ Odette said. ‘You’d need to be riding fast to keep them Welfare fellas off your back.’
‘Don’t worry about that, I’d have been riding fast enough.’ Millie shook her head in disgust. ‘Fifty years on and we haven’t come far. Some of them still treat us like we’re children they can do what they like with.’
‘What can they do to you?’ Sissy asked.
‘Never you mind,’ Odette said. ‘Come on, show Auntie Millie how you ride your bike.’
Sissy pedalled on ahead of the women.
‘You going okay?’ Millie asked Odette.
‘Same as I’m always going. Why you asking?’
‘I think you have some weight off you since I last saw you. And you look pale.’
On cue, Odette’s pain niggled her. ‘Pale? How does a black woman get to look pale?’
‘When she’s feeling crook, that’s how. You need to be seeing a doctor.’
‘There won’t be any chance of that. The last doctor I saw in this town was more than twenty years back. He was so afraid of touching me he stood on the other side of the room and washed his hands three times without even examining me.’
Sissy rode the length of the track and stopped when she reached the intersection with the main street. She turned and pedalled back to Odette and Millie.
‘Well,’ Millie said, ‘there’s this new doctor in town two days a week. A foreigner, he is. Yusuf went to see him not long back when he was having trouble with his eyes. All weepy from the years of dust and sand when he was taking care of the camels. He said this new fella was just fine. We were like two gentlemen, Yusuf said when he came home. He has rooms off the main street, behind the bank.’
Sissy circled the track several times, lifted her bum from the saddle and pedalled away. Odette called after her, ‘Hey girl, you be careful with my gift cards.’
Millie took hold of Odette’s arm. ‘We’ve not only got a new doctor. Have you heard there’s a new sheriff in town?’
‘I know. He fronted me on the footbridge a few weeks ago. I’ve never seen a good-looking policeman, but this one had a face like death warmed up. It’s taken a long time for Bill Shea’s drinking to catch up with him. This new one, he’s here to replace him.’
Odette and Millie had known Bill Shea since they were children, after his family moved into a house between Quarrytown and Deane. Initially, Bill and his older sister, Sarah, walked to school a few steps behind the Aboriginal kids, not sure of their place in the pecking order. It wasn’t long before the Shea kids fell in with the Aboriginal children. They mixed easily and played together when the school day was over. One afternoon Bill asked Od
ette if she would like to play in his front yard. When she hesitated, he said, It’s okay, our mum won’t be home for ages.
Odette was wrestling Bill into submission, having pinned his back to the rough buffalo grass, when she heard the rusting hinge on the front gate. Mrs Shea was unable to comprehend the scene in front of her. She looked down at her son lying beneath an Aboriginal girl. Odette never forgot the look of disgust on Mrs Shea’s face. Before the woman could get a word of protest out, Odette had bolted across the yard and hurdled the front fence. Sprinting along the track towards home, Odette could hear Mrs Shea yelling at her son. The next time she saw Bill on the way to school she called out his name. He ignored her. Bill’s sister turned around and threw stones at Odette. From that day on, Odette had never been inside a white person’s home, except to work for them.
‘It’s not Bill Shea’s drinking that’s getting him replaced,’ Millie said. ‘Or his shiny arse never leaving that seat in his office.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘They’re bringing in these new police all over the state.’
‘Why?’
‘Because some of them working for the government don’t like our people speaking up, calling for citizens’ rights. This isn’t the talk they want to hear. I heard they’ve been hand-picked, and I reckon this new copper is one of them. They want to keep us in our place.’
Odette watched Sissy up ahead as she tried riding the bicycle hands-free. ‘Where’d you hear this from?’ she asked.
‘I heard it. That’s all you need to know for now. I was also told that some coppers have been doing the old count again. Names. Age. Colour. Blood. The lot.’
‘Blood? There mustn’t be more than two dozen blackfellas between here and the ranges. Why would they bother with us? We don’t make a nuisance of ourselves and we ask for nothing. And there’s been no meetings about the citizenship round here. You can stop acting mysteriously towards me, Millie. If there’s trouble ahead for me and Sissy I need to know what it is, and I need to know where this story’s coming from. This might be nothing but drunk yabber or crazy talk, for all I know.’